Paul Krugman published a column in today's New York Times that redefines calumny; defamation, distortion, nastiness and any other negative word one can come up with to describe character assassination.
Believe it or not he is tarring Obama with the same brush used to tar Hillary for years.
Normally and generally he specializes in economic issues , but not today. Today he's the William Kristol of the Liberal set, a print version of Rush Limbaugh.
Ironically, today's column by Kristol is a relatively even handed analysis of the Obama/Clinton competition.
In stark contrast to Krugman is Frank Rich's piece in this past Sunday's NYTimes. I'm an Obama supporter, but I was also uncomfortable with Rich's level of discourse this time.
Then there's Stanley Fish who writes about the voluminous responses he's received on the topic of Hillary bashing. Clearly he's an apologist for Clinton, the main point of his thesis today being that Hillary haters have even gone so far as to decry the existence of such calumny, then proceed with their own defamatory remarks.
What's especially troubling about the messages from Krugman and Fish is the implication they provide that Obama is behind this Hillary bashing. The Liberals are getting the Swift Boat thing from each other in an internecine warfare of words.
Finally Roger Cohen, in the same rag today, writes not about Hillary or Obama bashing, but about Obama and Israel, supportive or non-supportive, pro Israel, pro Palestinian, both or neither. This piece seems to acknowledge Obama's need for what is called Realpolitik.
He calls Obama a "strong, but not uncritical" supporter of Israel. Talk about careful wording.
He cites Obama's tempering of a statement about Palestinians being oppressed by later adding words about that oppression being self-inflicted. He cites Obama's letter to the UN calling for denouncing Hamas's rocket attacks, and making a speech before AIPAC awhile back in which he didn't mention the settlements.
Cohen acknowledges the unusual power of Jewish Americans who make up 2% of the population but exhibit far more clout than might be expected from that level of minority. He excuses Obama's courting of the Israel lobby as saying, "That's O.K.. Obama has to play hard ball now".
The Times has endorsed Clinton. In just one issue of that paper two of their columnists support Obama, one supports Hillary, and one seems to like Obama's chances to get the nomination. But that's William Kristol, the mother of all Neo-cons, the wolf in sheep's clothing in his piece today.
The Times has endorsed Clinton. At least their columnists are not marching in lock step.
I'm afraid we ain't seen nothin' yet.
Leanderthal, Lighthouse Keeper
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1 comment:
You're on the mark about Krugman; he's had a vendetta against Obama for some time. I thought he was an Edwards supporter--and he may have been--but he's become mainly anti Obama. He's a classic example of a liberal who's afraid of change from the current model of all-out partisan warfare. Sad
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